


Landfall

by Rozarka



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-06
Updated: 2006-04-06
Packaged: 2017-11-11 04:58:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/474774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rozarka/pseuds/Rozarka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I think I love you," she said. "And the war is over."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Landfall

"I think I love you," she said, pushing a thick strand of nut-brown curls behind her ear, said it in such a normal, sensible voice that for long seconds Viktor grappled to reconcile the meaning of the words with what they had sounded like, something casual and friendly along the lines of _Chilly out here, isn't it?_ or _How about Italian for lunch_?

No ... no, he'd heard her correctly. "I think I love you," she'd said, standing on the windswept pier of this English seaside resort, and he stared at her, while she stared at the menu beside the door of the restaurant and after a protracted, deafening silence added, "And the war is over." Another silence. "The Fettuccine Piccata sounds very nice." 

"Vot ... vot did you say?" he got across numb lips, hoping to God that she wouldn't repeat the incomprehensible part about war and fettuccine, and she glanced up at him, her eyes naked as newborn babies.

"I think I love you," she said, and he saw clear warmth flooding her face. "And the war is over."

He opened his mouth. He knew what to say, yet somehow this seemed all too quiet and painless -- too unbelievably so. For a second he tasted something that was not quite bitterness but certainly close to outrage, that a prize so longed-for could come gliding in this easily, trailing seagulls and wisps of cloud, flanked by beach umbrellas and milky-white English toddlers. He'd held out for years. Had continued to hope against all reason.

He tried to think back to what he had been saying immediately prior to her ambushing statement, whether it could have been something like "Let's have Italian for lunch," a suggestion to which she might reply only jokingly, in playful assent, "I think I love you--"

But no. He hadn't said anything of the sort. He hadn't been talking at all. He had been standing at her side, looking down at her profile, loving the rosy glow from the brisk May wind on her cheeks and on the tip of her nose, had been thinking how grateful he was just to be seeing her healthy and glad again, that they had begun meeting as friends at last, had been swearing to himself that now she was grown-up and free he wouldn't screw this up, he would be so patient, that he could be patient for just a while longer --

He hadn't said anything at all, and then she'd said, "I think I love you."

"No, what I mean is that I ... I do love you," she amended now, more loudly, a nervous smile curving up the corners of her mouth, but her eyes weren't smiling. Except that deeper than he could see, he sensed they _were_ smiling. She bit her lip, an anxious habit he'd always adored in her, and he reached out almost in distraction and took her hand. Her palm was slick, stained by sweat, and in a bright bracing wave it rushed over him that she had said it because she _meant_ it, meant exactly _it_ , and she was still standing there shivering lightly in the wind and waiting for his reply.

He licked dry lips. Giddy joy mingled with completely unexpected fear. Did she _know_ what this meant? Did she know he would never let her go now? Did she understand that if her words were poorly considered, they had the power to destroy him? Was he prepared, really prepared to stop longing and start _having_ , after bringing this hard, stubborn yearning with him as his only sustenance for so long?

She squeezed his hand, and he knew from her unbearably gentle expression that she understood more than he could ever have the heart to tell her. She stood on tiptoe and pressed a tender kiss to the corner of his mouth. "I'm sorry," she said softly -- not in apology, because she had never hurt him with intention; they both knew that. She was just sorry for him having had to wait all these years: for her to grow up, for the war to be won, to have word from her, and then for her to be free. "I love you."

Viktor started breathing again. A big gasp of a breath, and then many fast, shallow ones. He hugged her to him, searched with his mouth across her cheek, her temple, and brushed his lips close to her ear. "Obicham te," he whispered. "Her-my-nee, mila, obicham te. Obicham te."

"I know," she said and turned her warm face to his mouth, and he kissed her, first time in seven years, a touch as dear as the scent of landfall, and as delicious as the deep of a rose.

-end-


End file.
